Home Depot, Inc. (The) (HD) Q2 2018 Earnings Conference Call Transcript

Home Depot, Inc. (HD -0.31%)
Q2 2018 Earnings Conference Call
August 14, 2018, 9:00 a.m. ET

Contents:

• Prepared Remarks
• Questions and Answers
• Call Participants

Prepared Remarks:

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to The Home Depot Second Quarter 2018 Earnings Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded. [Operator Instructions]

At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Isabel Janci. Please go ahead.

Isabel Janci -- Vice President of Investor Relations

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Joining us on our call today are Craig Menear, Chairman, CEO, and President; Ted Decker, Executive Vice President of Merchandising; and Carol Tomé, Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President, Corporate Services.

Following our prepared remarks, the call will be opened for questions. Questions will be limited to analysts and investors, and as a reminder, we would appreciate it if participants would limit themselves to one question with one follow-up. If we are unable to get to your question during the call, please call our Investor Relations Department at 770-384-2387.

Before I turn the call over to Craig, let me remind you that today's press release and the presentations made by our executives include forward-looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from our expectations and projections.

These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the factors identified in the release and in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Today's presentations will also include certain non-GAAP measures. Reconciliation of these measures is provided on our website.

Now, let me turn the call over to Craig.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Thank you, Isabel, and good morning, everyone. We're very pleased with our performance in the second quarter, achieving a milestone of the highest quarterly sales and net earnings results in our company history. Sales for the second quarter were up (sic) $30.5 billion, up 8.4% from last year. Comp sales were up 8% from last year with US comps of positive 8.1%. Diluted earnings per share were $3.05 in the second quarter.

Our results in the second quarter reflected what we call the bathtub effect. As expected, a majority of seasonal sales we missed in the first quarter were recovered in the second quarter. We also continue to see broad-based strength across the store and all geographies. In the US, all three of our divisions hosted positive comps in the second quarter, as did our 19 regions and top 40 markets. Internationally, Canada and Mexico posted mid to high single-digit positive comps in local currency during the quarter.

Our solid performance was driven by the outstanding execution of our store associates, merchants, suppliers, and supply chain teams. Navigating a sudden spike in demand like the one we witnessed in May isn't easy. For example, in the Northern Division, the variability in sales over a two-week period of time was as high as 2,770 basis points as the weather turned more favorable.

As Ted will detail, both ticket and transactions grew in the quarter. We saw a healthy balance of growth from both our Pro and DIY categories, with Pro sales once again outpacing DIY sales in the quarter. The alignment of our Interline and legacy outside sales forces around four targeted end markets continues to gain traction. These sales professionals are experts in their respective fields, providing valuable insight and partnership to the Pro customers that they serve. This, in turn, drives greater engagement in incremental spend.

Our digital business continued to be a source of growth. Online traffic growth was healthy and second-quarter online sales grew approximately 26% from the second quarter of 2017. Customer continue to respond to ongoing investments and enhancements we're making in support of the customer experience.

Delivering a best in class interconnected shopping experience encompasses much more than our digital properties and physical store assets. Our supply chain and the investments that we're making to enhance the delivery and fulfillment options available for customers is also an important area of focus. We have continued to develop and rule out new delivery capabilities. We've now ruled our small parcel express delivery from store, via car and van, in nearly all our major markets in the US with plans for further expansion.

Additionally, we told you that 2018 would be the year of the pilot as we test and learn with new fulfillment centers. I'm pleased to report that we are on track with our plan and opened our first MDO, or market delivery operation, during the quarter. In the second half of this year, we plan to open additional facilities. The opening of these facilities is a cross functional endeavor. From a real estate team that locates the appropriate sites, to our IT teams that develop the proprietary software that runs them, and our supply chain team that owns execution throughout, the buildout of the One Home Depot supply chain is truly a collaborative team effort. I want to commend everyone for their work thus far in getting our five-year journey off to a strong start.

Let me touch briefly on the progress we're making with some of our store investments. We have implemented our wayfinding sign and store refresh package in over 500 stores year-to-date, ahead of our initial plan. We also continue to make progress on the rollout of our redesigned front-end areas and BOPIS lockers, among other investments. We are only seven months into a three-year investing journey. We remain energized and excited about the work and the opportunities ahead. We're focused on improving the customer experience by investing in our business and in our associates.

Turning to the macro environment, the US economy and drivers for home improvement spending are strong. As Carol will detail, because of our outperformance in the first half versus our plan, we are increasing our sales and earnings per share guidance for the year. We now expect Fiscal 2018 sales growth of approximately 7%, and diluted earnings per share of $9.42.

I want to close by thanking our associates for their hard work and continued dedication to our customers as they once again successfully navigated our busiest selling season. Based on the first half results, 100% of our stores qualified for Success Sharing, our profit-sharing program for our hourly associates. We are very proud of their efforts.

And with that, let me turn the call over to Ted.

Ted Decker -- Executive Vice President of Merchandising

Thanks, Craig, and good morning, everyone. We had a strong quarter with results that exceeded our expectations. The team did a great job of maintaining excellent service levels while preserving high end stocks over a period of elevated demand. Our core business continues to perform well and, as expected, we saw record sales in our garden business as spring broke across the country.

Looking at our departments, lumber, indoor garden, outdoor garden, and electrical had double-digit comps in the quarter. Tools and appliance were above the company average. All other departments but lighting posted mid to high single-digit comps. Lighting had a low single-digit negative comp, driven primarily by LED price deflation.

In the second quarter, comp average ticket increased 4.9% and comp transactions increased 2.9%. Commodity price inflation in lumber, building materials, and copper positively impacted average ticket growth by approximately 119 basis points. In addition to core commodity inflation, we are now experiencing inflation in other areas. These inflationary pressures come in many forms, including rising raw material costs and transportation costs along with recently enacted tariffs. However, as the customer's advocate for value, it is our job to work with our partners throughout the value chain to manage these pressures.

Turning to big-ticket sales in the second quarter, we previously defined big-ticket sales as transactions over $900.00. Today, we are redefining big-ticket sales as transactions over $1,000, as they now represent approximately 20% of US sales. In the second quarter, transactions over $1,000 were up 10.6% compared to the second quarter Fiscal 2017. A few drivers behind the increase in big-ticket purchases were vinyl plank flooring, appliances, and strength with our Pro customers.

In the second quarter, sales to our Pro customers grew double digits. Pro heavy categories like lumbar, in-stock kitchens, power tools, windows, and concrete all recorded double-digit comps. As you heard from Craig, our professional salesforce is driving stronger relationships and a deeper level of engagement with our Pro customers, which in turn lead to higher sales. This partnership is particularly important with our MRO customers, where we saw strong mid single-digit growth in the quarter.

Sales to our DIY customers also showed solid results as they completed a variety of spring projects. Categories like lawnmowers, watering, patio, ceiling fans, and interior and exterior paint all had strong comps. In fact, our interior paint business had its best half performance in more than five years. While the favorable weather drove outdoor project activity, we also saw good performance for maintenance and repair categories during the quarter, with great results in water heaters, HVAC, safety and security, and air circulation.

During the quarter, we held our annual Memorial Day, Father's Day, and Red/White/Blue events. Our merchants' merchandising execution team in stores did a fantastic job bringing great value to our customers, which helped drive transactions, both in store and online.

As part of our focus on balancing the art and science of retail, we have created approximately 50 cross functional squads focused on agile development to improve the flexibility and ease of our online customer experience. As Craig called out, we saw strong growth in our online business, driven in part by an increase in our conversion rates. And our interconnected retail offering is resonating with our customers as 47% of all of our online orders are picked up in the store.

Now, let's turn our attention to the third quarter. We are thrilled to announce our new appliance partnership with Bosch. Bosch is one of the largest home appliance manufacturers in the world and brings over a century of product innovation and engineering to The Home Depot. We are excited to offer a broad selection of their appliances, both in store and online. Most notably, Bosch is recognized as having the quietest and most reliable dishwasher on the market today, and they own the number one brand position in the category.

Building on the success and momentum of our LifeProof carpet and vinyl plank, we are excited to introduce LifeProof slip resistant tile. LifeProof tile is 50% more slip resistant than ordinary tiles and is particularly good for wet areas like bathrooms, kitchens, and even outdoor patios. The innovative coating eliminates the need for gritty texture and does not freeze, fade, or crack. It is low maintenance and easy to clean. LifeProof tile is exclusive to The Home Depot.

We're also excited to be introducing some great new innovation across our Husky tool portfolio. The growing Husky brand is owned and backed by The Home Depot and offers incredible value to our customers who need tough, quality tools and storage at affordable prices. In mechanics tools, we're introducing new impact sockets that offer easier access in tight spaces. In plumbing tools, we're introducing a ratcheting PVC pipe cutter that requires less force to cut and allows for easy single hand operation. All of our Husky hand tools are backed by lifetime warranty and can be replaced at any of our stores.

In addition to great new products, we are excited about our upcoming events. As summer winds down and cooler temperatures arrive, we will have an incredible lineup of great values and

With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Carol.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Thank you, Ted, and good morning, everyone. In the second quarter, total sales were $30.5 billion, an increase of 8.4% from last year. Recall that at the beginning of Fiscal 2018 we adopted a new accounting standard pertaining to revenue recognition. The new standard changes the geography of certain items on our income statement, but has no impact on operating profits.

In the second quarter, the change in accounting positively impacted sales growth by $33 million. Our total company comps were positive 8% for the quarter, with positive comps of 11% in May, 7.5% in June, and 5.7% in July. Comps in the US were positive 8.1% for the quarter with positive comps of 10.6% in May, 7.6% in June, and 6.3% in July.

As you heard from Craig, our second quarter performance exemplified what we call the bathtub effect of a seasonal business. In other words, the majority of the seasonal sales missed in the first quarter due to inclement weather were recovered in the second quarter. And, as you've heard, we didn't just recover seasonal sales. Our total sales growth exceeded our expectations. On last comment on sales for the quarter -- foreign currency exchange rates had a negligible impact on sales growth.

In the second quarter, our gross margin was 34%, an increase of 36 basis points from last year. There were a number of factors that impacted our gross margin performance year-over-year, two of which can be isolated, and the third is just the net results of a number of factors. Specifically, we had $152 million of gross profit, or 46 basis points of gross margin expansion, due to the new accounting standard. We reported 16 basis points of gross margin contraction due to higher transportation and fuel costs in our supply chain. And, finally, we had 6 basis points of gross margin expansion due to the net result of a number of factors, including sales mix and the impact of recently acquired companies.

For the year, we expect our gross margin rate to expand by approximately 41 basis points. This expansion is down slightly from our previous guidance due to higher than anticipated transportation costs in our supply chain. In the second quarter, operating expense as percent of sales increased by 16 basis points to 17.9%, reflecting 90 basis points of expense leverage in BAU, or business as usual, offset by the impact of the new accounting standard and expenses associated with the strategic investment plan we laid out at our December investor conference.

Expanding on this, the new accounting standard resulted in a $152 million increase in our operating expenses and caused 48 basis points of operating expense deleverage. And expenses related to our strategic investment plan of roughly $174 million resulted in approximately 58 basis points of operating expense deleverage. Given our strong first half performance, we now expect our Fiscal 2018 operating expenses to grow at approximately 137% of our sales growth rate.

Our operating margin for the second quarter was 16.1%, an increase of 21 basis points from last year. For the quarter, interest and other expense decreased by $3 million to $246 million, and our effective tax rate was 24.7% compared to 36.6% in the second quarter of Fiscal 2017. The decrease in our effective tax rate reflects, for the most part, the benefit of tax reform. For the year, we continue to believe our effective tax rate will be approximately 26%. Our diluted earnings per share for the second quarter were $3.05, an increase of 35.6% from last year.

Moving on to some additional highlights, during the quarter, we opened one new store in Mexico for an ending store count of 2,286. Selling square footage at the end of the quarter was 238 million square feet. Total sales per square foot for the second quarter were $504.00, up 8.6% from last year. At the end of the quarter, merchandise inventories were $14 billion, up 9.1% from last year. Inventory turns were 5.4 times, up one-tenth from last year.

In the second quarter, we repurchased $2 billion, or approximately 9.3 million shares, of outstanding stock. This included approximately 2.1 million shares on the open market and approximately 7.1 million shares repurchased through an accelerated share repurchase, or ASR, program. We also received approximately 874,000 shares related to an ASR program we initiated in the first quarter.

Note that for the shares repurchased under the second quarter ASR, it is an initial calculation. The final number of shares repurchased in the second quarter will be determined in the third quarter, when the second quarter ASR terminates. Year-to-date, we have repurchased approximately $3 billion of our outstanding shares and now we expect to repurchase approximately $6 billion of our outstanding shares for the year.

Computed on the average of beginning and ending long-term debt and equity for the trailing 12 months, return on invested capital was approximately 37.9%, 590 basis points higher than the second quarter of Fiscal 2017. As we look to the back half of the year, we continue to expect strong economic growth with a backdrop of a healthy home improvement environment. Homeowners continue to enjoy home price appreciation, and rising wages and low unemployment have driven consumer confidence to record high levels. These trends are all supportive of our business, but we also know that in the second half of Fiscal 2017, we experienced over $600 million of hurricane related sales that we must comp.

So, today, we are lifting our Fiscal 2018 guidance primarily for our first half outperformance. Now, if there's a bias in our forecast, based on the economic environment and our August performance-to-date, the bias is to the up.

Remember that we guide off GAAP. Recall that Fiscal 2018 will include a 53^rd week, so the fourth quarter of Fiscal 2018 will consist of 14 weeks. For Fiscal 2018, we now expect sales to increase by approximately 7% with positive comps as calculated on a 52-week basis of approximately 5.3%. For earnings per share, we expect Fiscal 2018 diluted earnings per share to grow approximately 29.2% to $9.42. Our earnings per share guidance includes our intent to repurchase approximately $3 billion of outstanding shares in the back half of Fiscal 2018.

...

So, with that, I'd like to thank you for your participation in today's call. And Kat, we are now ready for questions.

Questions and Answers:

Operator

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question will come from Simeon Gutman with Morgan Stanley.

Simeon Gutman -- Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC -- Analyst

Thanks. Good morning, everyone. Nice quarter. I wanted to first ask about the macro. It probably will be a busy topic on it this morning. There is a lot of noise out there. There are a lot of healthy metrics, but there are also some cautionary ones. Home improvement demand and how it aggregates from declining existing home sales -- your guidance clearly doesn't imply that there's any reason to be worried. But, how do you look at the world now?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Simeon, we feel very positive about the strength of the home improvement sector and the customer's willingness to spend. I'll let Carol walk you through some of the details of how we actually think about it.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

We've expanded our thinking in this regard. We look at all housing metrics -- housing turnover, home price appreciation, new household formation, the age of the housing stock, and housing starts -- although that isn't as directly impacted to our business as the others. We've learned that you can't look at any housing or home improvement driver in isolation. They all play off each other. Let's taking housing turnover as an example. Housing turnover now stands at about 4% of units. That is in part because we have a housing shortage in our country. We only have 4.1 months of supply against a normal month-of-supply of more like 6 months.

With the housing shortage, home prices have appreciated. With home price appreciation, homeowners have more equity in their homes. In fact, home equity values have increased over 120% since 2011, about $73,000 per homeowner in terms of equity. So, as homeowners view their home as an investment and not an expense, they spend more. If we look at correlating our comp sales against housing turnover, going back to that number, to your point, we've disconnected. We think that has to do with this housing shortage. In a normal housing environment, where there is adequate supply, you see a pretty tight correlation between our comp sales and housing turnover. But now, we because we have this housing shortage, it's disconnected.

I could go on and on about the macro because I know there are a number of other things we could talk about. Craig, I don't know if you want me to continue on or pause.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

I think probably the biggest question we get is around affordability as it relates to the housing environment. With the increase in interest rates, when do we get worried about affordability? Carol can walk through how we think about affordability, but the affordability factor with interest rates doesn't impact the majority of folks.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

It's so very important, when you think about the affordability index -- right now, the affordability index for the country is 144. If you look at the historical average, it's 127. In the past, we said, "Well, if it gets to 127, that could be a watch out for us." But, as we thought about it, we thought that you really need to think about it on the margin. If only 4% of housing units are turning in a year, that means 96% of homeowners are staying in their home. They don't care about rising interest rates. In fact, they love rising home prices because their equity is worth more. So, when you think about affordability, it's the 96% of the housing units that are in place that are driving the home improvement spend and not so much the marginal turnover that the media tends to pay attention to.

Simeon Gutman -- Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC -- Analyst

Thanks for all of that. On affordability, you have this visibility and we don't. There are some markets in which the affordability index has dropped a little more severely than the average. This quarter was really about seasonal and bathtub effect, but can disaggregate those markets in which the affordability has deteriorate the most and what the topline trend -- anything in those markets of note?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Yeah. Let's just take Seattle. The home prices have been on fire, and on fire for a while. Our comp in the Seattle market in the second quarter was 7.7%.

Simeon Gutman -- Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC -- Analyst

Great. Got it. Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Our next question comes from Chuck Grom with Gordon Haskett.

Chuck Grom -- Gordon Haskett Research Advisors -- Analyst

Hi. Thanks. On the expense front, Carol, your growth factor saw a little bit of a stepdown here versus the pace in the first quarter, despite the better comp. I was just wondering if you could frame out some of the components for us -- the BAU. Also, looking ahead into the third and fourth quarter, how do you see it framing out?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Sure. So, in the second quarter, we had 90 basis points of expense leverage in BAU. If you look at the drivers of those 90 basis points, roughly 50 of the basis points came from payroll and payroll related items. You've heard Ann-Marie Campbell talk about a new labor model that she's introduced into the stores. We're driving productivity in our stores while, at the same time, increasing our customer reports. Our customers are very happy with the service they're getting in our stores. The rest of the leverage came from leveraging fixed costs as well as everything else. Productivity is a virtuous cycle here at The Home Depot. When you put up a comp of 8%, you expect to get pretty good expense leverage, and indeed we did.

As we think about the balance of the year, our expense growth factor for the first half of the year was 139%. We would expect it to be around 135% for the back half of the year, giving us the guidance that we gave you of 137%. And just to comment on the quarters, we would think the expense growth factor would be slightly higher in the third quarter than the fourth quarter because, remember, the fourth quarter has that extra weight.

Chuck Grom -- Gordon Haskett Research Advisors -- Analyst

Great. That's very helpful. Craig, on the MDOs. You said you opened up one so far. Any early learning so far? Can you quantify how many you think you're going to do on the back half of the year? Bigger picture, how do you frame out the opportunity across the board?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

First of all, it's very, very early to gather any learnings. We just got the facility open, but we're up and running and learning as we go. We won't disclose how many we will open in the back half, but if you think about the approach to this, it is using the advantage that we've built in our upstream network to feed the downstream opportunity that we have to continue to drive the way the customer wants to engage with us. Mark, do you have any additional comments?

Mark Holifield -- Senior Vice President of Supply Chain & Product Development

Right. The market delivery operation that we've opened is just part of our overall plan to drive the fastest, most efficient delivery in home improvement. Just getting started there, so it's very early days in terms of that. But, this is one of those stockless locations that's a delivery hub in a local area. We deliver primarily appliances out of there at this point, but we'll be adding more products to that as we go. Expect more and we'll keep you posted as we go in the second half and beyond.

Operator

Thank you. We'll continue on to Michael Lasser with UBS.

Michael Lasser -- UBS Securities LLC -- Analyst

Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. If we average out your comp transactions between the first and second quarter, to account for the seasonality and seasonal shift between those two periods, it looks like it was up around 0.7%. That represents the slowest traffic growth in the past few years. Do you think that's a sign that maybe the cycle is entering the later stages? What would cause that to reaccelerate from here?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

We probably need to look at your math, but when we look at our transactions for the second quarter and back out garden, or our seasonal business, our comp transaction was up 1.6%.

Michael Lasser -- UBS Securities LLC -- Analyst

Okay. That's helpful. Given all the discussion about tariffs and inflation, maybe you can tell us about your performance in the appliance category -- particularly, washing machines -- because that has been an area where there has been significant pricing passed through. Based on that experience, how to do you see the next few quarters unfolding in terms of elasticity of demand as you try and navigate through what's probably going to be a hotter inflationary environment?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Michael, at this point, the tariff environment is manageable. Given our sales, size, and scale, it's even that much more manageable. Overall, on the lumber tariffs with Canada and the laundry tariffs in washing machines, and the Section 301s that have come through, this is all low single-digit percent of our COGS and just 25-odd basis points of cost pressure. We are seeing increased cost requests from suppliers, particularly the ones that have been impacted by the tariffs. But, as you can see, the overall size is very manageable at this point.

Now, there are some categories -- laundry being the most specific -- where you had up to 25% and 50% tariff if you get over certain volumes of imports. For sure, that elasticity showed up -- you had mid-teen increase in the industry with laundry prices. And you did see some unit falloff there. But, as the Korean manufacturers get their facilities up and running in Tennessee and South Carolina respectively, that tariff pressure will mitigate because they'll be producing all their machines here domestically.

Michael Lasser -- UBS Securities LLC -- Analyst

Just to follow up on that, is there anything you can learn from the experience with washing machines that you might be able to apply to other categories, especially those ones that will be affected by the next round of tariffs?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Sure. We take a portfolio approach to this. These tariffs are very specific. They're calling out products with specific dimensions. So, it's not always even a category of goods. It's a specific unit or number of units within a category of goods. So, yes, we apply learnings and elasticity and we're not necessarily taking a one-for-one retail with a cost increase. We manage it at the portfolio level. With this gross, less than low single-digit percent of COGS, it's well within our scope to manage this at the portfolio level.

Michael Lasser -- UBS Securities LLC -- Analyst

Thank you so much and good luck.

Operator

Our next question comes from Kate McShane with Citi.

Jeffrey Small -- Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. -- Analyst

Hello. This is Jeff Small on for Kate McShane. Thank you for taking our questions. We want to first dig into the second quarter sales result. You mentioned that the majority of lost sales from the first quarter were recovered in the second quarter. I just wondered if you could quantify that amount and provide color? Will there be any ongoing benefit in the third quarter? Just curious if you saw any ongoing benefit from the hurricane recovery in your second quarter results as well?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Yeah, we can unpack that 8% comp for you this way. I'm going to round to make it easy. About 2 points of growth came from our seasonal business, about 1 point of growth came from the index-based commodity categories that Ted called out, another 1% came from hurricane related sales, and then the remaining 4 came from everything else.

Jeffrey Small -- Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. -- Analyst

Understood. That's helpful. I also want to dig into the comp performance of your newly remodeled and refreshed stores. I think 250 were completed in the first quarter and you're now through 500 of those stores. Can you provide any detail on the comp performance of those refreshed stores? We're also curious how many refreshes, or remodels, you expect to complete over the course of this year.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

For competitive reasons, we're not going to call out performance of those stores, but we're continuing to roll that through the back half of the year.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Yeah, we're really excited about the execution of this initiative. In fact, if you look at the capital that we spent for the first six months of the year, 50% of that went into the stores. Our team's just doing a great job of putting in everything we said we were going to do.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Yeah, we're super excited. The greatest penetration of stores will get our new wayfinding and sign package, which really brightens up the store and makes navigation of the store much easier. We also do what we call a general environmental cleanup of the store -- spiff the floors, add lighting, paint, remodel restrooms and breakrooms for the associates, etc. We're very pleased with the look and feel and our customer sat scores are trending up as we roll that out. As Craig mentioned, we're rolling lockers out, revamping some frontends of the store, putting buy online pickup in store storage lockers into the stores.

Also, very excited to be rolling out electronic shelf labels. We've not done this in the past and we're starting with our appliance department and we'll do over half the stores this year with sort of iPad sized electronic price signs and information on the appliance in our appliance departments.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

So, this is not for the faint of heart. There's a lot going on inside the stores. But, we piloted this for over a year before we even started to roll. And perhaps that's one reason why we're rolling faster than we thought we might.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Right.

Jeffrey Small -- Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. -- Analyst

That's very helpful. Thank you very much and best of luck in the third quarter.

Operator

We'll now hear from Steve Forbes with Guggenheim Securities.

Steven Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners LLC -- Analyst

Good morning. Regarding gross margin, were there any surprises this quarter? You called out transportation headwind 16 basis points, which I think is up about 8 basis points sequentially. But shrink wasn't called out. Is shrink improving and how do you expect that transportation headwind to trend as we move into the back half of the year?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

We, like the rest of the nation, are facing higher transportation and fuel costs. We reflected that in the guidance that we gave for our gross margin for the year now. We expect an expansion of 41 basis points for the year. Last quarter, we expected 44 basis points. So, we're doing our best to manage through it, but there's a real issue in the transportation markets in our country.

On the shrink side, shrink was one of those other factors. When I called out the drivers of gross margin performance, the change in accounting, transportation, and then all other -- shrink was in that all other bucket of 6 basis points of expansion. It was actually a hurt in the quarter, but we were able to offset with the benefits coming off of the newly acquired companies. We have a cross functional team that's working on shrink and, just yesterday, we had a really great report out and have hired a new loss prevention officer into our company. We're excited about that.

Steven Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners LLC -- Analyst

Just a quick follow-up. You called out that 100% of the stores qualify for profit sharing this quarter. How did that compare to last year as we conceptualize the year-over-year impact from the stronger performance of the business broadly? How do we think about that impact for the full year?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

For the first half -- and, if I recall correctly, for the first half of the last year we were 100% for our stores as well.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

[Crosstalk] Yeah, we might have been --

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Might have been two stores that missed last year.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Yes.

Steven Forbes -- Guggenheim Partners LLC -- Analyst

Thank you.

Operator

Our next question comes from Seth Sigman with Credit Suisse.

Seth Sigman -- Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC -- Analyst

Thanks for taking the question. Nice quarter, guys. A couple of follow-up questions here. First, in terms of the inflation impact on comps that you talked about, to clarify, it sounds like the bulk of the impact is just on commodity items at this point. Are you expecting to see more increases in some of the non-commodity items as you move through the year? And, from a competitive perspective, are you seeing any of your competitors handle the inflation differently, meaning maybe not pass as much through, get more aggressive, etc.? Thanks.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Yes. At this point, by far, the largest impact is the 119 basis points that we called out from core commodities. There are puts and takes in that, but for the most part, lumber, for example, is priced weekly. You might have some differential on a SKU or market here or there, but those tend to be priced competitively by everyone across the marketplace. We don't see large impacts in the second half from the non-commodity. In fact, commodity has come down meaningfully. Lumber and copper each, which are behind the 119 basis points, have moved down over the last 8 weeks. If you look at lumber prices, we are now, on framing, only 4% ahead of last year. And the peak there was about 40%. So, we're not going to see the same lumber inflation in the back half.

Panel prices, again, were 35-40% above LY, and that's now at about 1% over last year. The good news is, we spoke about elasticity earlier -- at 40% increase, and we saw such a sharp and quick run-up in lumber prices, we were starting to see an impact in units. But, over the last 6-8 weeks, as these prices have come down, units have responded nicely. We'll take the volume any day over price in commodities.

Seth Sigman -- Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC -- Analyst

Okay. Thanks for that color. On the digital business of 26%, a nice acceleration. I think it contributed 170 basis points to the comps, which is one of the strongest we've seen. Is this driven by the seasonal shift? Was there a benefit from that, or something else you can maybe point to that you think is driving that strength? I think a lot of it is still coming from the store, or picked up in the store. What are you seeing that's helping drive that acceleration? Thanks.  

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Overall strength in our online business, but certainly supported as well with the seasonal categories. It's interesting that seasonal businesses pick up in the online space just like they do in the physical space.

Kevin Hofmann -- President of Online & Chief Marketing Officer

Yeah, certainly, we saw balanced growth in both traffic and conversion, as we continue to manage the shift to mobile as well. We had really solid progress with our mobile properties. While we had strength across the stores, real strength in the seasonal businesses really helped.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

And 47% of our online orders are picked up inside of the store. So, we're really driving this interconnected experience.

Seth Sigman -- Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC -- Analyst

Great. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Matt McClintock with Barclays.

Matthew J. McClintock -- Barclays Capital, Inc. -- Analyst

Good morning, everyone. Craig, you talked about rolling out small parcel across all major markets now. Could you talk a little bit about the experience of what you're seeing in the business, in those markets, when that capability is rolled out?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Sure. We're actually very pleased with what we're seeing here, and it give us the ability to offer different value propositions to our customers. So, a customer who needs a smaller delivery, we can do that much more effectively and much faster for them. Then, it's providing leverage into our overall delivery capability. Right, Mark?

Mark Holifield -- Senior Vice President of Supply Chain & Product Development

That's right. Again, on the theme of the fastest most efficient delivery in home improvement, certainly we're fast when we have car and van same day delivery available from our stores in all of our major markets. We're almost there with all of our major markets. It's great, because that's incredibly fast, but it also has great coverage. We'd match our coverage of same day delivery up against anyone in the marketplace, and we'd say that our home improvement capability is unmatched in the marketplace. Kevin mentioned the drivers of digital growth. One of those is increased conversion due to faster delivery.

Matthew J. McClintock -- Barclays Capital, Inc. -- Analyst

Thanks for that. And, Carol, on the macro, I understand you have to look at everything holistically. But, is there any independent impact on certain product categories with housing turnover being as low as it is. I'm just trying to parse through with the 96% of the people that are staying in their house, 4% that are moving -- does that have an outsize impact on specific product categories or not?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Let's just look at the math of housing turnover. With 4% of units turning, that's about 5 million households turning. And I'm looking at occupied households today. That's 5 million units turning. The average spend is $3,500 per unit. That means the market opportunity for housing turnover is $17.5 billion. If you use our NYEX market share of 28%, that gets you $5 billion-ish of sales. So, $5 billion-ish of sales on our base of $100 billion suggests that turnover just isn't that important. Just for fun, I modeled what could happen, using that simple math, if turnover were to decline 15%. No one's projecting that. But model it just for fun. The impact on comps -- again, it's not very big -- was less than 1%.

So, to your specific question about category specific, we have no insight there. But, I'd bring it up to 40,000 feet and say it's just not that important.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

On categories, if you think about the number one project, it would be painting. You would think that if there was going to be an impact, it would be there. We just had our best paint quarter in five years.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Right. Exactly. Good point.

Matthew J. McClintock -- Barclays Capital, Inc. -- Analyst

Thanks for the color.

Operator

Our next question comes from Jonathan Matuszewski with Jefferies.

Jonathan Matuszewski -- Jefferies Financial Group -- Analyst

Thanks for taking my question. Could you talk a little bit to the traction you're having in home furnishings? It's a category, I believe, you're leaning into more with SKU count additions. Any color there would be helpful.

Ted Decker -- Executive Vice President of Merchandising

Sure. Very early days. We're adding a number of SKUs in things like tabletop, décor, rugs, etc. Very early days, but pleased with our traction. Significant growth, but on a low base. We've completed the integration of The Company Store, and one of our first integration moves was to list a lot of their better sellers on The Home Depot website. That just went live some weeks ago, and starting to see an uptick there. This is all a journey for our customers to find this product on our website and engage with The Home Depot in these adjacent, but we think very relevant, categories.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

If you think about the data that shows that average number of retailers that customers shopped in roughly the last four years has declined from 13 to nine. Our consumer research said that the customer trusts us to bring value and questions why we don't help them fulfill the balance of their needs in their home. This is an opportunity for us as we go forward, largely as this business continues to shift to the digital world. So, you should think about this as a digital strategy.

Jonathan Matuszewski -- Jefferies Financial Group -- Analyst

Great. Any updates on the B2B site that you're developing for the Pros? Is that currently being piloted in select markets? Any update there would be great. Thanks.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Sure. I'll let Bill address that.

William Lennie -- Executive Vice President of Outside Sales & Service

When we talked about this last December, we said this was a two- to three-year journey, and it will be to build out all the tools and applications that our professional business customers needs. We're still in the customer intercept interview phase and we're in testing mode. So, we'll probably get a couple of customers over on a small test as we go through Q3, but we'll see more activity around this space in Q4.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

We saw a demo of it yesterday, though, and the demo looked good. We've got to get it now out of beta into the customer's hands. But, it looked pretty good.

William Lennie -- Executive Vice President of Outside Sales & Service

Good progress as we lean into the initiative.

Jonathan Matuszewski -- Jefferies Financial Group -- Analyst

Great. Thank you, guys.

Operator

We'll now go to Matt Fassler with Goldman Sachs.

Matthew J. Fassler -- Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC -- Analyst

Thanks so much, and good morning, everyone. My first question relates to inventory. It was a very healthy quarter and inventory was up around the case of sales, but a bit more so than in Q1, and a bit above the rate of sales growth that you seem to anticipate for the second half of the year. So, any color on what drove the increase would be terrific.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

So, Matt, the main thing there is we're investing at an accelerated rate in merchandising resets. The inventory from a seasonal perspective is in great shape. We're at record high levels of in stock, which we felt was critically important to be able to capture the sales that we did in the second quarter. But, the main reason for the increase is the add on of new businesses and the investment in accelerated merchandising resets.

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Right. And just the capital associated with our merchandising resets alone this year is $275 million. So, we're investing into this for the long-term customer experience.

Matthew J. Fassler -- Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC -- Analyst

Gotcha. On the sales for the second half, you don't typically guide precisely to the quarter. Can you give us a sense of whether that second half sales guidance is, as you presented it today -- what was implied in the business plan at the end of Q1? And also, any comments given the storm impact on Q3 versus Q4 and the anticipated pace of business?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Right. So, based on the guidance we gave today, the comp in the second half of the year would be lower than the first half of the year. That meant the two-year stacks will be identical. Our two-year stack in the first half was over 12. That gives you a sense. There's no deceleration happening in the business.

On the storm side, I called out about a point of growth from hurricane related sales in the second quarter. We recovered 500 million of the 600 million we had last year, so we think we'll get another 100 million in Q3-Q4-ish. But remember, then we have to comp all this stuff, so it's a relative comparison. Does that make sense?

Matthew J. Fassler -- Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC -- Analyst

It does. You spoke about inflation earlier in the call. You started to see inflation last year, but it's been quite persistent. Any sense for the inflation backdrop imbedded in that second half guide?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

There isn't any.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

We really didn't. Like Ted said, we're seeing the commodity side of the inflation mitigate. It's really going away.

Matthew J. Fassler -- Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC -- Analyst

Okay. Thank you so much, guys.

Operator

We'll now go to Budd Bugatch with Raymond James.

Budd Bugatch -- Raymond James Financial, Inc. -- Analyst

Thank you very much for taking my question. Congratulations on the quarter. Pro penetration -- you've had some really great growth in Pro. I think penetration, last we knew, was like 40% of sales. Has that moved off at all with the continuing outpacing of Pro?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Yeah, actually we are seeing movement on that as we've consistently had our Pro business growth accelerate against out growth in DIY. So, we are seeing that.

William Lennie -- Executive Vice President of Outside Sales & Service

We would take the Pro penetration closer to 45% today. We've seen several years of growth where Pro outpaced consumer. Consumer strength has been there, but it's the activity and the home investment that Carol spoke to. The Pro growth has exceeded that and we'd peg it at about 45%.

Budd Bugatch -- Raymond James Financial, Inc. -- Analyst

And to your particular area, the integration of the outside sales force and the inside sales force -- can you give us a little bit of flavor of where that is in the Interline integration today? You've made a lot of progress, but where is that and what have you been pleased by?

William Lennie -- Executive Vice President of Outside Sales & Service

Craig spoke about integrating our outside sales force and that's been completed. We're seeing great collaboration across the organizations, which is allowing us to cross sell between Interline's inventories and Home Depot's inventories. And then, our sales professionals really provide a service beyond just product for our customers. They are experts in their field. With that, it does drive engagement. We've seen great strength, both in store and outside of the store, particularly with our accounts. So, that integration continues to progress nicely.

Budd Bugatch -- Raymond James Financial, Inc. -- Analyst

Thank you very much. Good luck on the second half.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Zach Fadem with Wells Fargo.

Zachary Fadem -- Wells Fargo Securities, LLC -- Analyst

Hey, good morning. With respect to your online business, would you say there are any particular categories where you tend to over index relative to your overall mix? Conversely, what are the categories that maybe haven't resonated with the consumers, haven't seen that response yet? Could you talk about the dynamics there?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

We've seen the opposite effect. There were categories that we anticipated the customer may not engage in the digital world, but that shopping experience actually starts in the digital world, even if it finishes in the physical world. So, if you think about things like flooring for doors, which you would traditionally think of as a category that would be purchased in store, in most cases, the shopping experience actually starts in the digital world. We've seen really nice engagement with the customer, really across categories.

Zachary Fadem -- Wells Fargo Securities, LLC -- Analyst

That's interesting. On the Pro, could you talk about any impact you're seeing from your data initiatives, and any evidence today that you're gaining share of the Pro wallet? With respect to the categories, where do you see the biggest opportunities to gain Pro share? Thanks.

William Lennie -- Executive Vice President of Outside Sales & Service

On the Pro data, through my view and our tools at the Pro desk, we've been able to provide better insights for our instore Pro sales associates. We've seen growth across all of our managed accounts and our portfolios. But, the fastest growing segment of our Pro business is the Pros that are in our stores and covered by our policies. So, it just shows that as we provide insights we can give them some guided selling tools, they engage more with the customers, and can provide better insights for us, what services and what products we can provide. That just leads to engagement and Pro growth. Strength has really been outpaced in store versus our outside sales, which is all about execution and in stocks and great relationships.

Zachary Fadem -- Wells Fargo Securities, LLC -- Analyst

Got it. Thanks for the color. Appreciate the time.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Chris Horvers with J.P. Morgan.

Christopher Horvers -- JPMorgan Securities LLC -- Analyst

Thanks. Good morning. There has been a lot of management changes at your largest competitor and I know it's early, but are you seeing any difference in terms of how they approach the market, whether from a customer service perspective or from a promotional perspective, or any other changes?

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Chris, our job is to focus on our customer. That's really what we're focused on doing.

Christopher Horvers -- JPMorgan Securities LLC -- Analyst

Understood. Besides appliances, you don't bank market share gains into your guide. Can you talk about how you assess your performance relative to the market in 2Q overall? Did you gain share in any sense on the breakdown in share between share capture in DIY versus Pro?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

If only we had that insight into share capture of DIY versus Pro. As you know, market share is a bit elusive for us. The best we can do is look at the NYEX 4441. If we look at the NYEX 4441, it would suggest that we gained share in the second quarter.

Christopher Horvers -- JPMorgan Securities LLC -- Analyst

And then, as you think about your outlook for market growth in the back half of the year, have there been any changes since you put out the initial guidance in 4Q, or since the 1Q update?

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

No. Home price appreciation is doing exactly what we thought it would do. Household formation is trending the way that we thought it would. The age of the houses -- well, they're getting older. The housing turnover is the only one that slowed down a little bit. But again, it's not that important. It's a driver of spend, not a driver of growth.

Christopher Horvers -- JPMorgan Securities LLC -- Analyst

Thanks very much. Best of luck.

Isabel Janci -- Vice President of Investor Relations

Kat, we have time for one more question.

Operator

Thank you. Our final question comes from Brian Nagel with Oppenheimer.

Brian Nagel -- Oppenheimer & Co., Inc. -- Analyst

Good morning. Congrats on a very nice quarter. There has been a lot of discussion about lapping the hurricanes in the second half of this year. As we look at what's happening now on the West Coast of the United States, with fires out there, how does Home Depot typically react with that? Is there an initial wave of demand that comes? Is there a long-term demand that comes as a result of that activity? Thanks.

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

First, our thoughts and prayers go to all the folks that are being impacted here. It's a horrible situation for sure. For us, the good news is that we don't have any structures that have been impacted, but we certainly have associates and customers who have been impacted. It's a tough situation. Fires are a tough thing. Fires destroy everything. Essentially, you're in a new rebuild from that point forward. That's obviously not the focus of our business. That's not where our strength or focus is. So, no. It's a tough deal for those affected. We feel for everybody that's going through this. You certainly hope for the safety of all the folks battling the blazes, our first responders.

Brian Nagel -- Oppenheimer & Co., Inc. -- Analyst

Got it. Congrats again on the quarter. Thanks.

Isabel Janci -- Vice President of Investor Relations

Thank you for joining us today. We look forward to speaking with you on our third quarter earnings call in November.

...

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude today's conference. Thank you all again for your participation. You may now disconnect.

Duration: 63 minutes

Call participants:

Isabel Janci -- Vice President of Investor Relations

Craig Menear -- Chairman, CEO, & President

Ted Decker -- Executive Vice President of Merchandising

Carol B. Tomé -- Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President of Corporate Services

Mark Holifield -- Senior Vice President of Supply Chain & Product Development

William Lennie -- Executive Vice President of Outside Sales & Service

Kevin Hofmann -- President of Online & Chief Marketing Officer

Simeon Gutman -- Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC -- Analyst

Michael Lasser -- UBS Securities LLC -- Analyst

Zachary Fadem -- Wells Fargo Securities, LLC -- Analyst

Christopher Horvers -- JPMorgan Securities LLC -- Analyst

Seth Sigman -- Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC -- Analyst

Brian Nagel -- Oppenheimer & Co., Inc. -- Analyst

Chuck Grom -- Gordon Haskett Research Advisors -- Analyst

Matthew J. McClintock -- Barclays Capital, Inc. -- Analyst

Jeffrey Small -- Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. -- Analyst

Matthew J. Fassler -- Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC -- Analyst

Jonathan Matuszewski -- Jefferies Financial Group -- Analyst

Budd Bugatch -- Raymond James Financial, Inc. -- Analyst

More HD analysis

This article is a transcript of this conference call produced for The Motley Fool. While we strive for our Foolish Best, there may be errors, omissions, or inaccuracies in this transcript. As with all our articles, The Motley Fool does not assume any responsibility for your use of this content, and we strongly encourage you to do your own research, including listening to the call yourself and reading the company's SEC filings. Please see our Terms and Conditions for additional details, including our Obligatory Capitalized Disclaimers of Liability.